Tattoo
by quickand2thepointless
Summary: Fai's future is more essential to him than his past, but Kurogane can't help but fixate on the secret of Fai's tattoo. Is it a mark of guilt? Just what is he running from and trying to hide? KuroFai one-shot, T rating.


**A/N: **KuroFai, I just can't quit you! After wrapping up _To the Beginning, _I've had a few new ideas bouncing around, including this. Hope you enjoy!

**Rating: **T for... lots of sexual tension?

**Timeline/Spoilers:** Timeline is post-Outo, falls around Piffle World. The world is my invention, and it represents nowhere particular (anywhere that has leather, tattoo parlors, motels, and pasta meals- take your pick!) Brief spoilers for Outo. The backstory I invented for Souma is purely fiction.

**Disclaimer: **Characters are CLAMP's, story is mine.

0o0o0o0o0o0o

**Tattoo.**

Kurogane was certain they were lost. He and Fai had looped around the same urban street several times already, thwarted by cordoned off streets and dead ends which forced them back to the same place they started. Fai had found an old map pinned to a community board, but neither of them could read the language, and with Syaoran and Mokona back at the motel looking after a sleeping Sakura, there was no one close they could ask. The area was under construction, and most of the people they ran into were helmeted workers who gave them odd looks. Kurogane had to assume it was their choice of clothing that bothered them. Sakura's exhaustion had prevented her from helping out, so Fai had taken care of the shopping on his own, ending up with a ridiculous leather pants and vest ensemble for Kurogane ("It's called 'biker chic'!") and a pair of cutoff jeans with yet another stomach-exposing top for himself. It may not have helped matters that Fai was hanging off of his arm, acting particularly needy after walking for so long in cheap sandals.

"Can't we just go into one of the shops and ask someone for directions?" Fai groaned, jutting out his lower lip. "If we stay out here any longer, we'll miss dinner."

"Who was the one who wanted to go investigate for a feather?"

"There's nothing wrong with wanting to be helpful to Sakura-chan! Besides, you were the one who wandered into this area in the first place! I just followed you!"

"If I could get us in, I can get us out again."

"Kuro-myuuu!" Fai shook him off and latched onto the door of the nearest shop. The name of the store was written in colorful spray paint in a language Kurogane couldn't understand, and the insides were even more foreign to him. Prints of odd patterns and ink drawings buried the walls, and in the middle of the room were two men seated with their shirtsleeves rolled up, bearing large forearms. A woman with dragons inked up and down her arms leaned over one of the men, holding a strange tool which outlined a drawing on his arm, a blood red heart with an arrow shot through.

"Helloooo," Fai started to call out, but Kurogane immediately gagged him with his hands.

"These are criminals," he hissed, jerking Fai back. "They're being branded!"

Fai pushed Kurogane's hand away. "Eh? Aren't those just tattoos?"

"That's what I'm saying! They're the mark of the guilty!"

"Mark of the guilty?" Fai's hand strayed to his neck, his fingers inching towards the skin of his back.

Kurogane grimaced. He had forgotten that Fai had also had such a mark, a phoenix shaped brand that had spanned the entirety of his back. He had never asked what crime Fai had committed, even though it had always seemed odd to him that Fai considered the mark his most precious item. Most criminals Kurogane had met in Nihon hated their tattoos, and had gone to drastic lengths to rid themselves of them, but yet Fai had wanted to keep his so badly that he'd tried to bargain with Yuuko in order to have her take his staff instead.

"In your world, no one received tattoos by choice?" Fai asked, his voice lost in the place he would not allow anyone else to go with him. "They had no other purpose?"

"Amaterasu- the empress- did not believe criminals were beyond redemption. But at the same time, she also believed harmful acts were burdens one carried with them, even if they were forgiven. For crimes punishable by the law, she would brand a small mark on the offending party's hand so they would not be able to hide what they had done from themselves. It's not exactly something an innocent person would want to carry around for the rest of their lives."

"Isn't that a bit harsh?"

Kurogane shrugged. "I didn't really involve myself in the formal matters of justice. My job was to protect the castle, and what happened to anyone I didn't kill after that wasn't my business. I only saw a branding the one time."

"And what was the crime?"

"A peasant had stolen from his liege lady many years ago and run away from the village. When he came back as an old man, he returned the money to the family and asked for forgiveness."

"And yet he was still branded?" Fai shook his head. "Where I came from, stealing from the rich is forgivable. Most of the time they don't even notice."

"That's what the man thought. The woman he had stolen from was the widow of a wealthy warrior, and she was never short for money. But only days before the peasant took the sum money from her, nearly all of her fortune had been seized by her husband's mother, who claimed that their marriage had never been formerly officiated and the woman could not claim herself as family. The peasant took the last funds she had, and after that, she and her infant daughter were forced to leave their home and go hungry in the streets. She was fortunate that the former emperor took pity on her and allowed her to serve as a maid in the castle, and also permitted her daughter to grow up alongside Amaterasu and become her personal guard. The woman had died before the man returned the money, but the daughter accepted it on her behalf. I happened to be there for that reunion, and the branding immediately followed."

"The daughter didn't step in on his behalf?"

"Souma? She was probably grateful to the guy since his actions led to her spending her life at Amaterasu's side. But Amaterasusaw it differently. 'Your crime does not disappear simply because you are sorry,' she said. 'You may have had your reasons, but your actions hurt two very real people and changed the course of their lives forever. If you are truly sorry, you must carry the mark of your actions just as surely as she carries it every day. And then you must use that mark to travel into the future with clarity, not blindness, in concern to those who your choices effect.'"

"I see..." Fai's fingers strayed to his back once more. "That makes sense. There are some things that never go away."

Kurogane stared him. He had never seen the tattoo on Fai's bare back, but he remembered its lines, the phoenix's broad wing span, the inky blankness. _Why? What did you do? What are you running from? What crime did you commit that won't go away, even though the witch took the symbol of it from you?_

He had told Fai many times that it didn't matter to him, and in a way it didn't. Fai's future was what was of importance, but the fact remained that what happened in the past was cutting Fai off from moving forward. Every day of his life he was wandering around encased roads, all routes of escape blocked off so that he traveled back to the beginning with every step he took. He'd been trapped for so long he'd stopped asking for help or assuming that there was any path beyond the one he'd been taking his whole life, the one that led nowhere new.

_What are you hiding? What did that phoenix mean to you?_

"I might be a criminal," Fai mused quietly, forcing a smile. "That sounds about right. But my tattoo wasn't forced on me. It was a gift. It was something I accepted."

"Something you accepted and didn't want to give up?"

"That's right!" Fai was being unusually forthcoming. Perhaps these details were insignificant to the greater picture. Perhaps they were lies. Or perhaps they were all true, and he simply didn't want Kurogane to think they were.

"Because it contained your magic?"

"Right again!"

"And because of the person who gave it to you? Because there was a reason they wanted you to have it?"

"Now you're just guessing. Perhaps Kuro-tan needs to learn how to travel into the future with clarity as well." Fai was smiling, but there was something predatory about it. Kurogane had stepped too far. Not that it mattered to him. Fai lived so guardedly that simply speaking to him was overstepping some line or another.

"Excuse meeee!" Fai trilled, calling out to the tattooed woman now that Kurogane was sufficiently distracted. "Do you know the way back to the Kozy Motel? We seem to have gotten lost."

As Fai and the woman chatted, Kurogane racked his brain, trying to remember anything he could about the phoenix. They were eternal creatures, ones who went out in flames but were reborn from their own ashes. It reminded him a little bit of how Yuuko described the nature of the soul, something that passed but did not die. It was a symbol of beauty and elegance, not the sort of thing you would give to a criminal. But what business did someone else have restricting Fai's magic? It belonged to him; wasn't it something he could do with as he pleased?

He knew he was thinking about it too much. They had other concerns in this place (like the all-important feathers he found himself forgetting from time to time), but after witnessing Fai's negligence in Outo and brushing so close to losing him altogether, it seemed almost careless to keep himself ignorant of everything Fai was working so hard to hide.

"All right, Kurorin," Fai said, returning with a well-drawn map. "Looks like the turn we were supposed to take is here. We're still about two miles away, but at least we know where we're going."

"Hmph."

"That's why you're supposed to ask for directions the moment you get lost, nee? If my feet get any more blisters from this, I'll make you carry me."

"I'm used to it. It's not like you weigh much of anything."

"Still, you'd probably drop me again. Can't have that!"

It had gotten even hotter when they'd stepped back outside. _Of all the things he could have bought for me, why did it have to be leather, _Kurogane groused to himself. Fai looked delightfully comfortable in his shorts and t-shirt. He looked delightful, period. The lack of a true smile was the only thing that dampened his face; with it, Kurogane may have doubted in his abilities to hold back.

"I have a feeling that you're thinking unnecessary thoughts again, Kuro-tan," Fai said, fanning himself with his hand. "There's no need to get fired up over tattoos."

"Is that so?"

"Mhmm. In fact, I think you'd look good with dragons on your arms like the woman had. It would look extra nice with that leather you're wearing."

"Do you plan on getting yours back?"

"What? My leather?" He wiggled his eyebrows.

"Your tattoo. There's no question I'll get Ginryuu back, but will you find a way to retrieve what you left with the witch?"

"Who knows?" Fai laughed. "It probably won't be a concern, in the end."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Who knows? And you really do ask too many questions for someone who doesn't care."

_Figure out what that means for yourself, why don't you?_

They fell silent for a moment, and Fai tilted his head up to the scorching late-afternoon sun, heaving a low sigh. "Don't you think," he said after a while, "it would be absolutely terrifying to have someone know everything about you?"

Kurogane shrugged, his own history coming to his mind. Would it bother him to have other people know? Would their knowing somehow change it in his own heart? It did annoy him when people felt pity on his behalf, but the thought of having his past grief laid in the open didn't come close to terrifying him. At the moment, it was simply something that was unnecessary disclose.

"No matter who knows, your wounds are your own to bear," he said finally. "That doesn't change."

"True. But someone will bear wounds of their own because of yours. That's the terrifying thing."

Kurogane gazed at Fai and the hollow smile pasted on his face. Perhaps it was terrifying. No one could feel your pain, but they could still feel pain because of you. But he wondered if it was really worse than having no one know anything at all, living a life where not a single person knew or cared that below the surface existed a person that had never been seen or loved or treasured. He wanted to know who the buried Fai was. But more than anything, he wanted Fai to want that person to be known, to stop being so afraid of what the consequences of living would be.

After a few minutes, they reached the road they had missed before, the way out of their endless wandering. Kurogane was somewhat embarrassed that he had passed it by so many times without realizing, but then again, Fai hadn't noticed it either.

"Ah, it was here all along,' Fai chuckled. "Hidden in plain sight."

"It always is."

"Hmm?"

"Nothing. Let's go."

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o

By time they made it home, they were too dusty and sweaty to sit down and eat, although they had missed dinner by an hour and were painfully hungry. "Let's at least wipe down a little," Fai suggested, looking mournfully at the sauce drenched pasta meal Syaoran had gotten to-go from the restaurant next door. "We can take a long shower after we eat. You go first."

"If we're just washing off, there's enough room for both of us."

"Is there?" Fai asked skeptically. He followed Kurogane into the bathroom in any case and began pulling out towels from under the sink. It really was too cramped. Sakura was staying in a room to herself across the hall, but their room could barely contain the fill of three men, even though they were used to traveling light. Kurogane and Fai could fit together in the bathroom if Fai slid himself onto the lip of the tub, but their legs were still brushing against each other. Kurogane couldn't feel his skin through the thick leather, but he could still sense the weight of Fai against him, a delicate point of contact.

Fai threw Kurogane a washcloth, which he promptly dipped under the faucet. He had no idea where the water came from in this odd building which didn't seem to have its own well, but he was grateful for its coolness. He pulled off his shirt and began cleaning off the sheen of sweat from his chest and the grains of dust from the construction site. It reminded him a bit of washing in the river after training at Shirasagi castle in the summer, but being half-naked in front of someone else hadn't meant anything back then, not like it did now.

Fai had the shower nozzle in his hands, spraying a stream of water against his arms. He was looking at Kurogane out of the corner of his eye, studying him without making a show of it. They'd seen each other like this already; it was nothing new. But each time it happened, it felt different. Little by little it had changed from merely sizing each other up to something more weighty. Kurogane had no idea what Fai saw or expected to see in him, and even if he knew, there was nothing more he could do than to allow himself to be watched and internally measured. Fai's thoughts were his own, and they were what they were. It was not his business to go around forcing them.

"Oi," he said, throwing the washcloth back to Fai. "Get my back. I'll get yours in a second."

"All righty!" Fai's voice was needlessly cheerful."Kuro-tan has such nice muscles. They really are the best." He slid the washcloth back and forth, chattering like an idiot as if to make everything charged and awkward go away. "I must look pretty pitiful in comparison."

But try as he might to lighten the situation, several points of their bodies were closely touching. Fai had needed to sit up from the tub in order to reach the top of Kurogane's back, so they were pressed together once again, one of Fai's hands on the washcloth and the other resting on Kurogane's shoulders. Had there not been so many complicating circumstances, it would have been perfectly natural for them to have each other right then and there (never mind the fact that Syaoran was on the other side of the wall, exploring the marvels of the television). Kurogane sighed. It would happen eventually at the moment it needed to happen, but there was no denying that he was being sorely tempted.

"There you go," Fai said, laying the washcloth over Kurogane's shoulder. Before Kurogane could turn around and face him, he turned around himself, exposing his back. "My turn."

The skin of his back was so white that Kurogane almost couldn't image a dark tattoo ever being there, covering the pure expanse. As he washed his skin, he traced the imaginary design where it might have been before Yuuko had taken it. In his mind, he recreated the noble bird, trying to place its importance into the puzzle of Fai. _A gift, a precious thing, a mark of the guilty, a symbol of beauty, a burden to carry into the future, the very same future which terrifies you so much..._

Kurogane had felt many drives within him in his life. Grief, revenge, becoming stronger, the urge to protect. But never before had he wanted to completely know another person as badly as he did with Fai.

Their eyes met in the mirror, and Fai released a tired sigh, though his lips were still forced into a smile. "Really, Kuro-tan," he said. "You try and see too much."

"No. Not enough."

"It's me you're trying to figure out, so you're not the one who decides that." He bit his lip, the smile vanishing. "If you look too far, you're the one who is going to be hurt the most. That's really... not something I want."

"I'm the one who'll make that choice, so you're not the one who decides that." He threw the washcloth aside and one by one placed his fingers on the bare skin of Fai's back. "You're not going to talk about it. I know that. But there's only so long you can try to hide from something you carry with you wherever you go."

"I wonder."

Kurogane placed a slight bit more pressure on the places where he was touching Fai's back. _I'll mark you here one day, _he thought to himself. _When you can't hide from me anymore, I'll give you something even more precious than what you've lost. _

"You think such unnecessary thoughts," Fai murmured, but he leaned into the touch for a moment with closed eyes and held breath before pulling away altogether, back in hiding, back to his endless flight from something that was little by little catching up.

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End file.
